Publications

June 2024
Teaching Note

Roku 2021

By: David B. Yoffie

Teaching Note for HBS Case No. 721-480. This case is used to explore the strategic concept of "look forward, reason back." Roku in 2021 is trying to figure out the future of television and streaming media. Students are asked to provide a vision for television and... View Details

Keywords: Technology; Television Entertainment; Forecasting and Prediction; Decision Choices and Conditions; Strategy; Strategic Planning; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Media and Broadcasting Industry

May 2024 (Revised February 2025)
Case

Choosing the Course of Passion: Brooke Boyarsky Pratt at knownwell

By: Jon M. Jachimowicz and Alexis Lefort

Brooke Boyarsky Pratt (HBS ’13) enjoyed considerable success in her early career, quickly climbing the ranks to associate partner at McKinsey, and later becoming an executive vice president at Berkadia, a Berkshire Hathaway portfolio company. Throughout these years,... View Details

Keywords: Passion; Career; Career Planning; Purpose; Personal Development and Career; Mission and Purpose; Identity; Business Startups; Health Care and Treatment; Health Disorders; Growth and Development Strategy; Market Entry and Exit; Health Industry; United States

May 2024
Case

Pernod Ricard: Uncorking Digital Transformation

By: Iavor Bojinov, Edward McFowland III, François Candelon, Nikolina Jonsson and Emer Moloney

This case study explores the opportunities and challenges of the digital transformation journey of French wine and spirits company Pernod Ricard. As part of the transformation, the company launched four key digital programs (KDPs) aimed at using data and artificial... View Details

Keywords: Business Organization; Business Divisions; Talent and Talent Management; Global Strategy; AI and Machine Learning; Analytics and Data Science; Digital Transformation; Digital Strategy; Advertising; Sales; Organizational Culture; Product Development; Decision Making; Technology Adoption; Alignment; Expansion; Food and Beverage Industry; France; Europe

May 2024 (Revised January 2025)
Technical Note

Health Care Payment in the United States

By: Robert S. Huckman, Jeff Charca and Craig Garthwaite

This document provides an overview of how various actors (e.g., physicians, hospitals, and other health care providers) are paid in the United States health care system. It is particularly focused on features of the payment system that contribute to strategic decisions... View Details

Keywords: Compensation and Benefits; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Health Industry

April 2024
Article

Decision Authority and the Returns to Algorithms

By: Hyunjin Kim, Edward L. Glaeser, Andrew Hillis, Scott Duke Kominers and Michael Luca

We evaluate a pilot in an Inspections Department to explore the returns to a pair of algorithms that varied in their sophistication. We find that both algorithms provided substantial prediction gains, suggesting that even simple data may be helpful. However, these... View Details

Keywords: Algorithmic Aversion; Algorithmic Decision Making; Algorithms; Public Entrepreneurship; Govenment; Local Government; Crowdsourcing; Crowdsourcing Contests; Inspection; Principal-agent Theory; Government Administration; Decision Making; Public Administration Industry; United States

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March 2024
Case

Negotiating the Gift of Life (A)

By: Alex Chan

Describes a negotiation where lives are truly at stake, where key lessons on persuasion and the role that identity might play in a negotiation are on display through an effort by a frontline negotiator from OneLegacy, the US's largest organ procurement organization. As... View Details

Keywords: Economics; Negotiation; Communication; Diversity; Nonprofit Organizations; Emotions; Health Industry

March 2024
Supplement

Negotiating the Gift of Life (B)

By: Alex Chan

Keywords: Economics; Negotiation; Communication; Diversity; Nonprofit Organizations; Emotions; Mission and Purpose; Health Industry

March 2024
Module Note

Module Note on the Structuring of Collaborative Work

By: Ethan Bernstein

This module note for instructors describes the organizational structure module of the Managing Human Capital course that integrates insights from research on workplace connectivity (who gets to communicate with whom) and workplace transparency (who gets to observe... View Details

Keywords: Human Resources; Management; Organizational Design; Organizational Structure; Human Capital

March 2024 (Revised March 2025)
Background Note

Physical Climate Risk

By: Michael W. Toffel, Spencer Glendon and Alison Smart

This note describes how managers can identify their company’s physical climate risks, which can heighten the risk of business disruption, change the costs of operations and supply chains, and affect the demand for their goods and services. The note also provides a... View Details

Keywords: Resilience; Maps; Climate Risk; Climate Impact; Modeling And Analysis; Climate Change; Risk Management; Demand and Consumers; Supply Chain; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Disruption

2024
Working Paper

Corporate Culture Homogeneity and Top Executive Incentive Design: Evidence from CEO Compensation Contracts

By: Dennis Campbell, Ruidi Shang and Zhifang Zhang

We examine how corporate cultures characterized by high degrees of homogeneity in the underlying values and beliefs of organizational members are related to the design of CEO incentive compensation contracts. We argue that culture homogeneity within firms lowers... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Culture; Compensation Design; Accounting; Management Control; Incentive Systems; Organizational Culture; Job Design and Levels; Governance; Executive Compensation; Motivation and Incentives

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January 2024 (Revised June 2024)
Case

Equal Justice Initiative: Mercy, Truth and Dignity

By: V. Kasturi Rangan, Gerald Chertavian and Brittany Logan

In 1989, the Equal Justice Initiative was established as a non-profit, public interest law firm by Harvard Law School graduate, Bryan Stevenson.

EJI provides legal assistance to condemned prisoners, people wrongly convicted or unfairly sentenced, children in... View Details

Keywords: Equality and Inequality; Nonprofit Organizations; Mission and Purpose; Growth and Development Strategy; Social Issues; Race

January 2024
Supplement

Winning Business at Russell Reynolds

By: Ethan Bernstein and Cara Mazzucco

In an effort to make compensation drive collaboration, Russell Reynolds Associates’ (RRA) CEO Clarke Murphy sought to re-engineer the bonus system for his executive search consultants in 2016. As his HR analytics guru, Kelly Smith, points out, that risks upsetting—and... View Details

Keywords: Restructuring; Talent and Talent Management; Compensation and Benefits; Growth and Development Strategy; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Culture; Performance Evaluation; Motivation and Incentives; Consulting Industry

January 2024 (Revised June 2024)
Case

School of Rock: Tuning into Structured Empowerment (A)

By: Tatiana Sandino, Jeffrey Rayport, Samuel Grad and Stacy Straaberg

In summer 2021, School of Rock was a youth-oriented music education company with 291 franchise- and company-owned schools globally. Before CEO Rob Price’s hire in 2017, School of Rock’s nonconformist rock ‘n’ roll culture led to variability in teaching styles,... View Details

2024
Working Paper

Private Regulation, Institutional Entrepreneurship and Climate Change: A Business History Perspective

By: Ann-Kristin Bergquist and Geoffrey Jones

Private regulatory systems, including voluntary efforts by firms to restrain their own behavior are the primary form of global climate change governance. However, when environmental challenges first rose up on the scientific and political agendas during the 1970s, the... View Details

Keywords: Certification; Climate Change; Environmental Regulation; Business History; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Policy

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January 2024 (Revised May 2024)
Case

Private 5G Networks

By: Andy Wu and Maggie Yang

In the late 2010’s, 5G emerged as a new standard in communication technology. 5G was designed to enable ultra-reliable low-latency communications (URLLC), massive machine-type communication (MMTC), and enhanced mobile broadband (EMBB) (see Exhibit 1 for a detailed... View Details

Keywords: 5G; Communication Technology; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Technological Innovation; Innovation Strategy; Telecommunications Industry